The Influence of Strata on the Nutrient Recycling within a Tropical Certified Organic Coffee Production System

Table 1

Annual litter and nutrient additions from different components of litterfall in the coffee agroecosystems.

	Species		Inputs from litterfall (kg (hayr)^−1, dry weight)
			Litterfall	N	P	K	Ca	Mg	S
Upper stratum	Inga spp.
	I. adenophylla	Leaves	3199	65.26	4.79	10.09	15.36	3.20	4.80
		Branches	814	6.43	0.47	1.62	4.31	0.49	0.81
		Flowers	1593	34.41	3.57	7.01	10.67	2.07	3.19
		Fruits	204	0.12	0.29	1.85	0.86	0.18	0.43
		Total	5810	106.22	9.11	20.56	31.20	5.94	9.23
	I. oerstediana	Leaves	2627	54.12	1.85	7.63	19.18	2.36	4.99
		Branches	417	3.04	0.29	0.80	2.84	0.25	0.38
		Flowers	675	nd	nd	nd	nd	nd	nd
		Fruits	94	1.95	0.12	1.25	0.57	0.12	0.17
		Total	3813	59.11	2.26	9.68	22.59	2.74	5.54
Middle stratum	Coffea arabica	Leaves	2210	54.15	3.60	27.51	40.22	4.64	5.97
		Branches	29	0.27	0.03	0.04	0.18	0.04	0.03
		Flowers	nd	nd	nd	nd	nd	nd	nd
		Fruits	793	0.87	1.08	9.08	1.67	0.95	1.27
		Total	3032	55.29	4.71	36.64	42.06	5.63	7.26
Lower stratum	Weed
	Commelina cf. virginica L.		1136	35.22	4.65	46.48	8.75	3.07	1.48
	Urtica sp.		1028	32.07	3.94	25.60	18	2.78	2.26
	Solanum nodiflorum Jacq.		1476	43.25	4.68	48.88	14.17	2.36	4.87
	Oxalis mollissima R. Knuth		1272	36.12	4.03	43.39	10.56	3.18	2.16
	Drymaria cordata L.		1224	30.23	4.15	44.40	5.88	2.94	5.75
		Total	6136	176.89	21.44	208.75	57.34	14.32	16.52